


Fish and Chips

by alianora



Series: Carnival [11]
Category: Firefly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-10
Updated: 2010-01-10
Packaged: 2017-10-06 03:09:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 983
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/49024
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alianora/pseuds/alianora
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The morning after.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fish and Chips

Jayne was sleeping. Or trying to. Only there was a little girl standing outside the door of his bunk, tapping lightly.

He knew it was her, it couldn't be no one else.

He pulled the pillow over his head and proceeded to ignore her.

He had been up late enough, dragging her, and then her stupid turtle, all over the fair and then back to Serenity. He was tired, gorramit.

But that little tapping was awful annoying.

She'd been out there for a good five minutes or so. And she just kept tapping on the door.

He glared at the underside of his pillow. Ignoring wasn't working.

He threw the pillow halfheartedly at the door of the bunk. It bounced off of the ladder and landed on the floor.

The tapping trailed off in confusion.

Jayne snorted in satisfaction and tried to get back to sleep.

The tapping started again, this time accompanied by a girl voice. And she was whining.

"Jayne," came the girl voice. And yep, it was the girl. Tap, tap, tap. "Jayne, it is morning!"

Jayne determinedly faked a snore.

The tapping, and the voice, took on an annoyed tone. "It is morning and Turtle has walked himself home and Jayne needs to get up to see the present!"

He grunted in irritation, squeezing his eyes shut as tight as he could.

The tapping came again. "Jayne!" The girl voice cried. "If you do not get up, Turtle will not speak to you for the rest of the day!"

He snorted. Yeah, that was a threat to be afraid of, right there.

There was a waiting silence from outside the door.

Jayne could almost hear her little foot tapping. She was probably standing there, with that big squishy turtle tucked up under one arm, waiting for him to come out so she could annoy him some more.

But he weren't getting up. He was staying right where he was. And no matter how hard she tried to look at him with those eyes, even she couldn't look through solid metal.

Well, he was pretty sure she couldn't.

There was still silence going on outside his bunk, and it was starting to make him a little restless.

He knew she was out there. She was waiting. She was trying to trick him.

He narrowed his eyes suspiciously at the ceiling.

It weren't going to work. No, sir.

No little tiny slip of a girl was gonna trick him into coming out to see if she was alright, just to..just to..

Well, she was up to something. That much was clear.

And he couldn't let her be out there, being up to something, right outside his bunk. Who knows what she could do?

She could be taking the screws out of his door, right now, so that it would fall on him when he tried to open it. She could be rewiring the cockpit so that the lights came on when you tried to speed up.

She could be out there, doing all that stuff.

And if Mal caught her, and found out that Jayne had known she was up to something, Jayne was gonna be the one in deep gos se.

Which totally weren't fair.

Jayne let himself sulk as he rolled out of bed. Just because the girl was evil shouldn't have nothing to do with him.

He muttered, "Hell, no, Mal, I didn't know nothing about it!" to practice sounding completely innocent. It failed miserably.

He needed the girl to use her eye trick on Mal, that's what would work. But that would mean talking to the girl and being involved in whatever she was up to.

He glared sullenly up at the door, once he actually had pants on. It so weren't fair. She was up to something, and he was gonna be the one got in trouble.

He stomped up the ladder and flung open the door.

No one was there.

No girls with big eyes up to no good. No squishy turtles looking harassed.

Just a small fabric bag.

Jayne nudged it with his foot, but it didn't blow up or move or anything. It crackled some. And was a little..squishy.

He watched it suspiciously, but it continued to be a bag.

And the girl continued to not be there.

So, he glanced around, grabbed the bag, and ducked back into his bunk. No use being up if he didn't have to be.

He dumped the bag out on his bed, and poked at it in confusion.

There was a couple of bits of paper, a deck of cards, and two weird looking embroidered things.

The cards was new and everything. One of the bits of paper was stuck to the front.

_Tonight, War is declared._

Which made about as much sense as anything she ever said. He shrugged, and moved on to the fabric things.

They looked kinda like..fish.

Jayne picked one up and examined it. It was only as long as his little finger.

It _was_ a fish. Embroidered on a couple of scraps of some rich looking fabric. Probably ripped from one of the doc's fancy vests. It was even stuffed and everything.

He swam it experimentally in front of him while he was trying to puzzle it out.

The note made sense, sorta, if you knew the girl and her weird way of talking.

 

_For your pockets. To keep you company. _

They were not won in battle, as Turtle, but created from cloth and hope and thanks.

Swimmingly yours.

 

Huh. He squished one of them between his fingers thoughtfully. Fish.

She had said she was gonna win him some.

Guess this was as close as she could get.

He shook his head at girls and their foolishness, but tucked the fish into his pocket anyway.

He liked fish, was all.

He didn't even notice he was grinning.

END


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